Dept of Animal Husbandry & Dairying (DAHD)

The Department of Animal Husbandry & Dairying (DAHD), operating under the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry & Dairying, serves as the Government of India's nodal agency for the livestock and dairy sectors. These sectors contribute significantly to rural incomes and underpin India's status as the world's largest milk producer. Based in New Delhi, DAHD formulates policy and administers programmes covering cattle and buffalo breeding, dairy infrastructure, poultry, feed and fodder, and animal health.

DAHD encourages entrepreneurship through the Startup Grand Challenge in animal husbandry and dairying, which supports innovative solutions in digital livestock monitoring, quality testing, supply-chain efficiency, waste-to-wealth and animal nutrition. Winning startups receive grant funding, mentoring and pilot opportunities with established cooperatives.

Key schemes include the Animal Husbandry Infrastructure Development Fund (AHIDF), a ₹15,000 crore fund providing interest subvention and credit support for dairy and meat processing, feed plants and breed-improvement infrastructure; the National Programme for Dairy Development (NPDD) and Rashtriya Gokul Mission for breed development and milk-cooperative strengthening; and the National Livestock Mission, which includes entrepreneurship and capital-subsidy components for poultry, sheep, goat, piggery and feed ventures. Startups, FPOs, cooperatives, individual entrepreneurs and MSMEs working in livestock, dairy, poultry, feed and allied value chains are eligible under the relevant schemes. Founders building livestock-tech, dairy-tech, animal-health or feed and nutrition solutions seeking non-dilutive grants, subsidised credit and pilot access should monitor DAHD's Startup Grand Challenge and scheme notifications at dahd.nic.in.